Easy Apple Crumble

The warm, sweet, gooey softness of baked apples topped with the crunchy, crumbly, almost savory topping is perfectly paired with a steaming cup of tea. This is why I love baking apple crumbles. What better way is there to enjoy a cold, lazy Sunday afternoon than to have the smell of cinnamon and apples wafting out of the oven, enveloping your home in a warm, comforting feeling.

The great thing about crumbles are that they are easy to make and even easier to polish off. It is just what you need to cope with the thought that the weekend is coming to an end.

Here is an easy recipe for an apple crumble which I have taken from Nigella Lawson’s website and modified slightly.

Ingredients

5 apples

1 tsp cinnamon powder

4 oz plain flour

½ tsp baking powder

¼ cup finely chopped almonds

5 tbsp castor sugar (If the granules are large then coarsely powder them in a food processor)

4 oz cold butter (chopped or cubed)

Tsp lemon juice

Tsp of flour (for apple mixture)

Instructions

Preheat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius.

Peel and core apples. Roughly chop them up into chunks. Place them in a bowl and add a tsp of flour, 2 tbsp of sugar, half the quantity of cinnamon and the lemon juice and toss together so that the apples are evenly coated.

For the topping mixture, sift the flour and baking powder in a bowl. To this add the remaining cinnamon, almonds, remaining sugar and mix well. To this mixture add the chopped butter and mix with fork till the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Take special care that the butter is very cold. If the butter is warm the mixture will turn into dough.

Butter an oven proof bowl or container and lightly dust with flour. Place the apples in this bowl and add the topping mixture over this. Before baking, lower oven to 150 degrees Celsius and bake for about 30 to 40 minutes.

For a nice golden brown crumble, place the crumble under a grill for a few minutes. But be really careful to check after a minute or two as it will brown really quickly.

Serve warm with ice-cream or vanilla custard.